Thoughts on Life, Love, Politics, Hypocrisy and Coming Out in Mid-Life

Wednesday, April 18, 2018

Crisis for the GOP: Trump Tax Cuts Are Still Unpopular

Yes, I am still pissed about taxes - and so are many other Americans who sadly end up paying more in taxes than those far wealthier and/or many large corporations. The good news is that perhaps those screwed by the Trump tax cuts - the "corporate greed/billionaire relief act" might be an apt name for the bill rammed through by Republicans - will vent their wrath come November, 2018. The only thing humorous about the situation is that Republicans seem blindsided by the public reaction thus demonstrating the danger of living in the Fox News bubble or listening to "economists" who have proven to be consistently wrong since the 1980's. A piece in New York Magazine looks at how and why voters are rightly realizing that the GOP sold them down the river. Here are excerpts:

Between 1980 and 2016, the American public never met a tax cut it
didn’t like. . . . on each occasion, a plurality of voters were onboard.

And then, America met the Trump Tax Cuts. When Congress
passed the president’s signature legislation in December, it was the least
popular tax bill in modern American history — a measure even less popular than
the tax hikes passed under George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton.

For
American conservatives, this was a harrowing development. It was one thing for
the public to disdain
the GOP’s attempts to pare back Obamacare — retrenching the welfare state
has always been the sour note in the right’s paean to “small government.” But
if fiscal conservatives can no longer sell voters on across-the-board,
deficit-financed tax cuts — untainted by any simultaneous attack on the safety
net — what are they so supposed to sell them?

Initially,
Republicans took solace in the thought that their bill’s unpopularity was
merely the product of Democratic duplicity. . . . Surely, Americans would love
the Trump tax cuts once they got to know them. The proof
would be in the paycheck — and, failing that, in a
multimillion-dollar Koch-funded ad campaign.

Alas:
Americans have now been collecting post-tax-cut paychecks for more than two
months — and they still don’t like Donald Trump’s signature legislative
achievement. In fact, as Republicans fan out across the country Tuesday for “Tax Day”
rallies celebrating their law, the vast majority of voters still refuse to
accept that their taxes have even gone down. But don’t take my word for it —
take the American
Enterprise Institute’s. In a new polling analysis, the right-wing think
tank concedes that “overall opinion [of the Trump Tax Cuts] is still more
negative than positive,” while an overwhelming majority of Americans say that
their paychecks haven’t grown conspicuously fatter. . . . while 53 percent
foresee a negative impact from “higher deficits and disproportionate benefits
for the wealthy and big corporations.”

If
voters do not believe that across-the-board tax breaks have positive economic
benefits — and resent tax cuts for the rich more than they appreciate ones for
themselves — then it’s going to be nigh-impossible for conservatives to realize
their “small government” vision on the federal level.

On Meet the Press last Sunday, Paul Ryan (unintentionally)
explained why
this is the case. . . . . The most obvious problem with Ryan’s response is
that it’s an unabashed lie: After observing the initial effects of the Trump
Tax Cuts, the Congressional Budget Office predicted last week that the
legislation will single-handedly add $1.85 trillion to the deficit over
the next decade.

But a more fundamental flaw in Ryan’s argument is that — to
most Americans — it reads like a case against tax cuts. If an
unavoidable, demographic change is making it more expensive for the government
to meet its obligations to retirees, then why on Earth did Republicans make reducing
revenue their top legislative priority?

Further,
to the extent that Social Security’s “20th century” design “doesn’t work,” it
is because the program is too austere, not too generous. The collapse
of private-sector pensions — along with the failure of wage
growth to keep pace with the rising costs of health care, housing, and
higher education — have left Americans more dependent on Social Security
benefits for their retirements, not less: As of 2016, nearly
half of U.S. families had no retirement account savings at all, according
to a report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).

Last
spring, 61 percent of Americans told Gallup that their income-tax burden was
already “fair” – while just 4 percent told Bloomberg that “tax policy” was the
most important issue facing the country. Meanwhile, large majorities of the
public — including, in one Morning Consult survey, a majority of
self-identified conservatives — voiced support for increasing federal
health-care spending.

There was no popular outcry for “middle-class tax cuts” in 2017 — let
alone, for giant corporate cuts financed by reductions in health-care
subsidies. The GOP assumed that voters would come around to its view on
“starving the beast,” once they got their share of Uncle Sam’s
rations. They assumed wrong.

Democrats are already winning
elections in Red America by spotlighting the GOP’s fringe fiscal
priorities. In recent weeks, striking
teachers have won victories of their own by the very same method. The Koch
network can afford to lose such battles. But by passing the first unpopular tax
cut in modern memory, Republicans have proven themselves incapable of winning
the wider war. When the “rubber hits the road” — and voters are forced to
choose between maintaining entitlement benefits and keeping tax rates low —
there’s never been less doubt about which they’ll choose.

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Out gay attorney in a committed relationship; formerly married and father of three wonderful children; sometime activist and political/news junkie; survived coming out in mid-life and hope to share my experiences and reflections with others.
In the career/professional realm, I am affiliated with Caplan & Associates PC where I practice in the areas of real estate, estate planning (Wills, Trusts, Advanced Medical Directives, Financial Powers of Attorney, Durable Medical Powers of Attorney); business law and commercial transactions; formation of corporations and limited liability companies and legal services to the gay, lesbian and transgender community, including birth certificate amendment.

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